RINOs of America UNTIE | UPDATE!

Okay. That's a joke. I think the original T-shirt read, "Bad spellers of America Untie."

From Y'all Politics:

One endorsement is usually not enough to move the needle in a campaign. However, when taken in totality, endorsements often provide a very clear picture of where the battle lines are drawn in a contested race. There is no clearer example of that than the race between Thad Cochran and Chris McDaniel.

It goes on to list the endorsements the two clowns candidates running for the United States Senate-- you know, that great deliberative body-- have garnered. 

Cochran has the NRA. McDaniel has Gun Owners of America. 'Nuff said. But if you need a good laugh this morning, go check out both lists. 

UPDATE:
Aggie comments:

I'm writing in my dog.

OH MY GOODNESS!!

I got a personal phone call from Sarah Palin today! No S&^%!! Sarah P@Lin call3d m3 t0d@y!!!!!

~~

The phone has been ringing off the hook this weekend.

"Hey! I'm Some State Senator you've never heard of from Winona! I am proud to be a member of Mississippi Conservatives-- a group of Cochran ass ki88ers that sprang into existence about 36 hours ago. ... "

Every single person who is making fun of this Senate primary race is right to do so. This is Mississippi politics at its finest.

Laugh Out Loud.

"They don't smell like this in the grocery store," said Miss M.

"No. No they don't," said I. 

I pulled carrots today. I rinsed the dirt off in the outdoor sink and moved them inside.

Miss M took it from there.

She sorted the carrots into 'salad' and 'cooking' piles according to the 'peel' criteria-- if it's too small to peel... .  She then cut off the tops, rinsed them once more-- Miss M does not care for dirt-- and placed the tops into the gumbo pot along with some parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme & onion so I could simmer a few quarts of carrot top stock. We love carrot top stock. 

So for a few hours in mid-day, the kitchen smelled liked homegrown carrots. 

And then it smelled like pumpkin. 

I've begun this story in the middle of things-- for you literary  folk, that's in medias res. Earlier in the day, Mr Big Food & I had rectified his records with the true inventory of my freezer that I'd conducted a few days ago. We discovered 3 2 pounds of mashed pumpkin from last year. We used one pound today to make pumpkin pound cake. 

Like sucks, don't you know?

Later on it smelled like citrus and chicken and peppers. We still have 9 5 whole halves of pepper halves for stuffing from 2012!!!! And so we had a delightful chicken dish with an orange, onion, herb topping. It was good. And peppers stuffed with shredded carrots and whatnot.

Here's the funny thing. I've noticed-- though I can't point to any specific reference-- that other folks who garden do what we did today. The veggie freezer is pretty empty right now. It's a good time to tidy it up, take stock, and consume the last of yesteryear's harvest. 

And begin again! 

Mayfest Meanderings

So one thing led to another today and we wound up at Mayfest-- a celebration of the founding anniversary of a little town down the road.

As a GRIT, this offended Miss M. Here's my counter: Look how fat that's lady's thighs are! She's trying real hard to be Southern. 

And then we stopped in at the junk/"antique" stores on our way home.

WE SCORED.

This is real wood. Not that flimsy teaky stuff.

:-) Life is weird. 

We already have this. And Miss M has more.

Picnic!

Sausage, Peach, Cherry, Pepper

Repeat.

Serve with 

potato salad.

One of the strangest potato salad recipes I've ever seen. You boil the potatoes in the skins, peal, and toss with 1/4 C apple cider vinegar. Separately, while the potatoes are soaking up the apple cider vinegar, you cut up celery, onion, etc. and toss them with mayo-based dressing. Mr. Big Food used the Thousand Island we've been having on our salads. 

And then you combine it all.

Delicious. 

2-4-6-8 Who do we appreciate?

We've had some rain and cooler weather so I've been opening the windows in the Den the last few evenings.

Missy does love to look out the window.

Occasionally, something on the wind will capture her attention 

and she will signal to Rocky that he should come running & pay attention, too.

And then he gets bored and hops back up on the bed b/c he doesn't smell anything.

"Please forgive me, but I've had quite enough."

"'Enough' of what, Missy?"

"Well. You know. I know Rocky has a job."

"That's right. His job is to guard the joint. He is a Vicious Pit Bull."

"RUFF."

"But you know what? I am trying to have a job, too. I am trying to guard the joint, too, Marica! Pardon me for being so bold, but you have no idea how many evil vicious smelly things there are out there wandering around your garden."

"ruff."

"I know. There are armadillos and possums."

"Do you know how foul-- is that the right word? Fowl? they smell?"

"No."

"And all the while I am trying to guard your vegetables from these evil... ."

"ruff."

"And I bark in my robust bark and you think it's cute... .  I quit. You don't appreciate the danger I signal. You don't appreciate the work I do. I am under appreciated. I quit. I am just gonna be a fat and lazy dog like that dawg on heyhaw."

"Oh! No! Please don't quit, Missy."

.... 

"Mr. Big Food saved some of the fat from that roast for you."

"Ummm."

"R.U.F.F."

To My Dear Husband: The Quest

The book, whose inscription has garnered a fair amount of attention here on the blog, is The New Quest by Rufus M. Jones (1928).

Jones was a Quaker:

Rufus Jones (writer) 

Rufus Matthew Jones (January 25, 1863 – June 16, 1948) was an American writer, magazine editor, philosopher, and college professor. He was instrumental in the establishment of the Haverford Emergency Unit (a precursor to the American Friends Service Committee). One of the most influential Quakers of the 20th century, he was a Quaker historian and theologian as well as a philosopher. He is the only person to have delivered two Swarthmore Lectures.

This particular book was discarded by the Sanders Memorial Library of Clarke College, Newton, Mississippi and somehow made its way to the Palmer Thrift Shop in Starkville, Mississippi where I purchased it for $0.50. (Books are 1/2 price lately.)

We should all be Quakers. 

May Mrs. Thomas Lockhart and her Dear Husband rest in peace knowing that her Christmas gift to him has at last found a deserving home.

Must be a theme

Blue skies everywhere!

Double Nickel Farm, New Mexico

Framboise Manor, Nova Scotia

To My Dear Husband UPDATED AGAIN! AND AGAIN

Can you make this out? 

Clearly a Christmas gift. 

UPDATE:

Thanks, Aggie!

To My Dear Husband

Whose constantly reaching out into new quests enriches our lives and brings us richer life forever. 

Doris ? Lockhart

UPDATE 2

judydee suggests in the comments that it's "Mrs. Thomas Lockhart." That looks right to me. It was 1928. Married women did refer to themselves as "Mrs."

UPDATE 3

Mr. Big Food's Dad weighs in via email:

"I think it says ... and brings us richer life experience(s)..."

Recipe: Dilly Casserole Bread

Served with Salad Nicoise

DILLY CASSEROLE BREAD

2 1/2 - 3 C flour
2 T sugar
2-3 t minced onion
2 t dill seed
1 1/4 t salt
1/4 t soda
1 pkg active dry yeast
1 C (8 oz.) cottage cheese
1/4 C water
1 T butter
1 egg
butter, softened
course salt, if desired

In large bowl combine 1 C flour, sugar, onion, dill seed, salt, soda, and yeast. In saucepan, heat cottage cheese, water, and 1 T butter until very warm. Add warm liquid and egg to flour mixture. Beat at low speed until moistened. Beat 3 minutes at medium speed. By hand, mix in remaining 1 1/2 - 2 C flour to form a stiff dough. 

Cover. Let rise in a warm place until double in size about 45-65 mins.

Punch down. Turn into greased-- not oiled-- round casserole dish. Cover. Let rise until double in size... . About 30-40 mins. 

It's bread, for crying out loud. 

Bake at 350. 

Recipe: Salad Nicoise

This recipe calls for "2 quarts torn, mixed salad greens" which we have times infinity -1. (Because it's nonsensical to multiply infinity. We have a lot of lettuce.)

It's an old favorite recipe

from an old favorite cookbook-- now falling apart-- that I've had since before the Girls were born.

It is the vinaigrette that hold everything together. So it's not so much a recipe for a salad as it is an inspiration. Note the carrots-- nowhere to be seen in the recipe- but I pulled them and marinated them. Two weeks from now-- after this evening's rain-- the canned beans will be replaced by fresh. 

SALAD NICOISE

Vinaigrette Dressing

3/4 C salad oil
3/4 C tarragon white wine vinegar
1/4 C chopped green onion
2 T snipped fresh parsley
2  t salt
1 t dry mustard
1 t sugar
1/2 t tarragon crushed

Salad

16 oz. can cut green beans, drained
2 quarts torn, mixed salad greens
2 tomatoes, sliced
2-3 hard cooked eggs, cut into wedges
6 1/2 oz can white tune, drained
3-4 anchovy fillets, drained [OMIT]
3-4 slices salami or summer sausage, cut into strips
1/2 C ripe olives
1 C tiny whole pickled beets, drained.

Combine first nine ingredients in container with tight cover. Shake well. Pour 1/2 C over beans. Marinate 1 hour, chilling thoroughly. Toss salad greens with enough dressing to coat; place on two large platters, Drain marinated beans.; arrange on salad greens with remaining ingredients.

TIP: Select a combination of 3 salad greens from...

[That's not a problem!]

Capers, artichoke hearts, green pepper strips or strips of boiled ham are also good in this salad.

~~
Serve with Dilly Bread.

Please excuse me a moment...

O. M. G.

Are you kidding me? The Supreme Court has been fallible since forever, i.e., since the great jurist John Marshall-- who was jolly but slovenly-- set the tone.

And what is with the unit of analysis here? "The Court?" As if the Court is an entity not comprised of individuals?

Please do excuse the interruption. Via Instapundit.com, this just hit me wrong. 

Quick Kitten Update

[Because I know you're only humoring me when you pretend to care about history and crappy old books and such.]

Yesterday morning only two kittens were in the box. We didn't see hide nor hair of the mamma. Miss M set out a bowl of cat food topped with a spoonful of tuna. We checked on them periodically throughout the day and gave them a dropper full of water later in the evening. 

We were prepared to go into full-on kit* rescue mode this morning if necessary. Zero kits this morning but the food bowl was empty.

There have since been two sightings of mamma in or near the garage. AND the food bowl is again empty. 

So... . The kits are around here somewhere and Miss M is doing her best to see that the mamma is well-fed.

*"Kits" because the mamma can apparently read. She put them in the old packing box marked "kit."

supper

Remember

In Flanders Fields

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
     That mark our places; and in the sky
     The larks, still bravely singing fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
     Loved and were loved, and now we lie
          In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
     The torch; be your to hold it high.
     If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
          In Flanders fields.

--John McCrae

We have broken faith. 

Decoration Day

My perusal of prose and poetry regarding Decoration Day lead me to believe there was once an appreciation for the lives fallen soldiers left behind.

Quart #4

Garden News:

I'll remember to take some photos tomorrow.

Things are coming along nicely.

I've dried almost 4 quarts of oregano. I did have to move the drying operation outside because 8 hours of drying really heats up the kitchen.

We will have garden peas. That is exciting.

We are looking for a pea sheller for the blackeyes.

As you know, we have lettuce. And we have carrots.

Carrots are odd. You think you have carrots and you pull something up and realize that you don't yet have carrots. And then-- one day-- you have carrots!

I have a question.

I did a smidgen of scholarly research on the author of this poem.

A. E. Housman
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A. E. Housman
Born	Alfred Edward Housman 26 March 1859 Bromsgrove, Worcestershire
Died	30 April 1936 (aged 77) Cambridge
Pen name	A. E. Housman
Occupation	Classicist, Poet
Nationality	British
Alma mater	St John's College, Oxford
Genres	Lyric poetry

Alfred Edward Housman (/ˈhaʊsmən/; 26 March 1859 – 30 April 1936), usually known as A. E. Housman, was an English classical scholar and poet, best known to the general public for his cycle of poems A Shropshire Lad. Lyrical and almost epigrammatic in form, the poems wistfully evoke the dooms and disappointments of youth in the English countryside. Their beauty, simplicity and distinctive imagery appealed strongly to late Victorian and Edwardian taste, and to many early 20th-century English composers (beginning with Arthur Somervell) both before and after the First World War. Through their song-settings, the poems became closely associated with that era, and with Shropshire itself.
Housman was one of the foremost classicists of his age and has been ranked as one of the greatest scholars who ever lived.[1][2] He established his reputation publishing as a private scholar and, on the strength and quality of his work, was appointed Professor of Latin at University College London and then at Cambridge. His editions of Juvenal, Manilius and Lucan are still considered authoritative.

[My emphasis.]

"One of the greatest scholars who ever lived." 

Good Lord! I'm sure you-- Dear Scholared Readers of Literature-- have heard of him but I hadn't until today.  

Q: Why is this?

That question assumes the premise-- that Houseman was one of the greatest scholars who ever lived. (I'm no philosopher, but I think that's called "begging the question.") And that he was a good poet. 

So I swiveled my chair around to pick up Miss M's copy of The New Oxford Book of English Verse 1250-1918 (Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, ed., Oxford University Press, New York, 1955, 1939, first published 1900) and I see that A.E. Houseman has a grand total of three (3) poems (pp. 1052-53) included.

So I'm not buying it. 

If he was one of the greatest scholars who ever lived who just happened to write poetry, he'd have gotten more than what amounts to a page in this 1100+ page anthology in 9-pt font. 

I did like the poem, though. I thought it appropriate for Decoration Day. 

A Poem for Decoration Day

Here Dead Lie We 

Here dead lie we because we did not choose 

To live and shame the land from which we sprung. 

Life, to be sure, is nothing much to lose      

But young men think it is, and we were young.

A.E. Houseman  

Found in Other Men's Flowers: An Anthology of Poetry, A.P. Wavell, ed. G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York, 1945.

Godzilla! We had a delightful meal

Chicken stewed with prunes

And then we watched the original Godzilla

with Perry Mason

Spoiler alert. They blew him up.